Arthur C Clarke once said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” You might not think this quote could apply to the simple act of writing, something we do daily, but two and a half millennia ago, ordinary Greeks so closely associated writing with magic that just scrawling a few letters on a bit of broken pot was thought special enough to give as a gift to the gods.
Literacy in ancient Greece
Before I explore writing in the context of religion and magic (the two were fairly inseparable in ancient Greece – both magic and the gods being supernatural forces), it is necessary to establish what level of literacy existed in classical Greece. How many people could read and write? How much could they understand of the written word? This is not an easy question to answer, and scholars such as Rosalind Thomas (1992, 11) have suggested that estimates of the level of Greek literacy are meaningless without defining what precisely is meant by literacy. So what can we say about Greek literacy?
The evidence is there if you know where to look. Commercial notations on containers used in trade at Athens are simplistic, consisting of one or two symbols to denote the contents of the container, and a few more to state the price or volume (Lawall 2000, 21). Since trade was important to everyone – people needed to buy food, wine, olive oil, etc – it is thus logical that such marks should be understood by the majority of the people engaged in trade – not just male citizens, but also women and slaves.
Small portable ceramics such as drinking cups and lamps occasionally have names written on them, often abbreviated; these are believed to be name tags, indicators of ownership of the object in question (Lang 1976, 26). Such items demonstrate that the owner either could write their own name or knew someone literate enough to write it for them.
One of the best known types of writing from Classical Greece are ostraka – pieces of broken pots with the names of politicians on, used to vote in ostracisms. Citizens of democratic Athens had the opportunity to banish for ten years anyone they thought was getting too powerful or ambitious, by voting for them with ostraka. One examination of handwriting on ostraka suggests that the majority of voters could write the name of the politician they wanted to exile (Brenne 1994, 18-20). A different study, looking at a group of 190 ostraka found together, all with the name Themistokles scratched on them, found just fourteen different hands (Broneer 1938, 231-232). It has been suggested that they were written for the illiterate by the literate, though this cache could have been more politically motivated, pre-prepared by Themistokles’ political rivals. Overall, it seems likely that the majority of voters could write someone else's name – though remember voters were Athenian citizens. Ostraka don’t represent women, slaves, children or resident foreigners.
Writing, Magic and Religion
One of the key items which suggests the conceptual link between magic and writing is a single bit of broken pot found in a shrine. Discovered among votive offerings at Hymettus in Attica – items dedicated to the gods to fulfill a promise previously made, usually in thanks for a safe journey or good crops – was a piece of pot with ΑΒΓ, the first three letters of the Greek alphabet, scratched on it (Blegen 1934, 15-17). Other similar items, known as abecedaria, with more letters of the alphabet and found in non-religious contexts, seem to simply be practice for those learning to write.
It has also been suggested that curses were thought to be more potent if they were written down (Thomas 1992, 80), and indeed it seems that names written backwards were intended to invoke harm on the named individual (Lang 1976, 15). Here the act of writing something either creates, or increases the power of, magical harm.
While Athens has produced that largest quantity of material with which to discuss literacy, it is not the only source for this topic. Interestingly Sparta – otherwise largely devoid of anything written – also provides interesting information. In Sparta, only those citizens who had died either in battle defending Sparta, or in childbirth, had their names written on tombstones (Plutarch, Lycurgus 27); those, in short, who had given their lives for Sparta. This restriction, this way of commemorating those Spartan citizens who were most revered, might have been in place as a result of writing having what Cartledge calls a “quasi-magical” quality (1978, 35).
Conclusion
Thus it appears that in general the level of literacy among Athenian citizens was limited, for the main part, to the ability to write one’s own name and understand marketplace markings on vessels containing produce like oil, wine, grain and honey. Meanwhile abecedaria have been found in votive settings, and it appears that written curses, particularly with names misspelled or written backwards, were thought to have greater potency. With the exception, therefore, of those familiar with writing such as playwrights, historians and philosophers, many other ordinary Greeks seem to view writing, something they don’t understand, as magical.
Sources:
Blegen, C. W. 1934. ‘Inscriptions on Geometric Pottery from Hymettos.’ American Journal of Archaeology 38, pp 10-28.
Brenne, S. 1994. 'Ostraka and the Process of Ostrakaphoria'. In W. D. E. Coulson, O. Palagia, T. L. Shear, Jr., H. A. Shapiro and F. J. Frost (eds.) The Archaeology of Athens and Attica under the Democracy. Oxford: Oxbow Books. Pp 13-24.
Broneer, O. 1938. ‘Excavations on the North Slope of the Acropolis, 1937’. Hesperia 7, pp 161-263.
Cartledge, P. 1978. ‘Literacy in the Spartan Oligarchy’. The Journal of Hellenic Studies 98, pp 25-37.
Lang, M. 1976. The Athenian Agora: Results of excavations conducted by the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Volume XXI: Graffiti and Dipinti. Princeton: The American School of Classical Studies at Athens.
Lawall, M. L. 2000. ‘Graffiti, Wine Selling, and the Reuse of Amphoras in the Athenian Agora, ca. 430 to 400 BC’. Hesperia 69, pp 3-90.
Thomas, R. 1992. Literacy and Orality in Ancient Greece. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Plutarch, Life of Lycurgus. Translation by R. J. A. Talbert. 1998. London: Penguin.
Alice Leiper - I have a masters degree in the archaeology of the Classical Mediterranean, and a decade of experience writing fiction.
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